U.S. Clexit’s Benefits Continue! DER SPIEGEL: ‘CLIMATE ALLIANCE IS CRUMBLING’

If we can believe Spiegel, it looks like the German political-climate blitz, led by Chancellor Angela Merkel, aimed at isolating and humiliating the United States, particularly President Donald Trump, appears to have run aground.

The Paris Climate Accord may be having its D-Day.

Image cropped from Spiegel here

According to the online English version of Der Spiegel, “The German chancellor had been hoping to isolate Donald Trump on climate issues at the upcoming G-20 summit in Hamburg“, but a number of longtime US allies have decided that the overall relationship with America is more important than the flakey, UN-manufactured “climate crisis”.

Merkel’s international defeat

Spiegel writes that Merkel led the charge to try to get 19 countries of the G20 to turn against America and “make Trump a bogeyman of world history. A score of 19:1“.

Japan, in part due to obvious North Korean factors, is also hardly ready to upset its longstanding crucial Pacific ally.

No sooner did Merkel launch her climate anti-Trump campaign at the G7 summit did it begin to crumble, first because of pragmatism out of Canada, and then Great Britain. Merkel was not able get the six other countries of the G7 to make a statement against Trump. Spiegel sums up: “Climate policy is great, but when it comes to national interests, it is secondary.”

What’s left of the G7 attempt to isolate Trump is a lonely gaggle of Germany, Italy and France.

Spiegel summarizes it is “a defeat for Merkel” when it comes to climate policy and international leadership.

No mention of “climate” in G20 draft statements

Concerning the G20 meeting in Hamburg in July, there are already signs that the climate issue will also be secondary there as well. Spiegel writes how several drafts for joint statements have circulated and: “There isn’t a single mention of the climate in the document.”

Now that Merkel realizes her strategy to isolate Trump is not working, Spiegel writes that German government officials are now “eager to avoid turning the climate statement into an instrument of power politics” and that Merkel will likely to “retreat” to a role of mediator.

But it’s an election year and the race to bash and “to stand up to” Trump is as intense as ever. In polls Merkel’s CDU/CSU party currently holds a huge lead over the crumbling SPD socialist party, led by Martin Schulz. Merkel probably could even afford softening her anti-Trump stance.

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